Monday, September 26, 2005

A Word from the Director

A message posted as a comment to the last post from our director Ms. Jessi Burgess.
Dear Reader:

There were many fantastic costume adventures this weekend as actors were strapped, squeezed and cajoled into many fantastic fabric combinations of designer Jenn Miller's devising. Miller has spent the past two weeks combing through the costume stocks of every theatre company within a 60 mile radius of the District. Her work has paid off! Esteemed Reader: in my humble opinion, Miller has hit upon what is known in the industry as COMIC GOLD.

Elizabethan period clothing is HILARIOUS!

First and foremost, please call to mind the ubiquitous neck ruff (designed to, what, catch the pieces of breakfast that missed your pie-hole? To make you look more like a saint in a Renaissance portrait? To help amplify your ability to hear, since Elizabethans prized a fine-tuned sense of hearing more than anything?).

Second, try pairing that silly starched-stiff collar with a dainty pair of stockings and some pumpkin breeches so short that Daisy Duke would blush. Or, if you happen to be playing Queen Elizabeth, you may want to slip into a hoop skirt that makes you as wide as you are tall--and then try to fit through a doorway.

Incidentally, the run of ACT ONE yesterday proved exciting! Although we have rehearsed the whole play so far out of order, we have managed to spend time on (almost) every scene in the play. I was thrilled with the work that everyone did to string together their journey through that act, and the work that everyone did last night was incredibly heartening. There IS a There there, Scotty, and we shall arrive at it within the coming weeks in a blaze of glory, farce and low comedy--alliteration be damned!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hooray for absurd costumes! Don't you just love those funny looking slashed clothes?